The FDA recently announced the approval of a new seasonal influenza vaccine called Flublok. Flublok is set apart from other flu vaccines because it is a trivalent vaccine made using an insect virus expression system and recombinant DNA technology.

“This approval represents a technological advance in the manufacturing of an influenza vaccine,” Karen Midthun, MD, Director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research, said in a press release. “The new technology offers the potential for faster start-up of the vaccine manufacturing process in the event of a pandemic, because it is not dependent on an egg supply or on availability of the influenza virus.”

The efficacy of Flublock was studied at various sites in the US: 2300 people received the new vaccine and a control group received placebo. Flublok was about 44.6% effective against all circulating influenza strains, not just the strains that matched the strains included in the vaccine.

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